101 Weddings Review

These bleak, messy weddings that you are made to be a part of, seem to be in desperate search of making a point; something that they never manage to achieve.VeeyenSun, 25 Nov 2012

AUDIENCE RATING

'101 Weddings' is a film that has left the Recycle mode turned on. Everything in it, be it the vast array of characters, the story situations or the events , seem like a rehash of people and incidents that you have seen several times before.

What they have indeed tried to do is to make the basic premise a bit different. Hence, the story is set against the backdrop of a mass marriage function, where three men, Krishnan Kutty (Kunchacko Boban), Jyothi Krishna (Jayasurya) and Antappan (Biju Menon) arrive with distinct intentions of their own.

Kalavoor Ravikumar's script that banks on the very basic idea of mistaken identities, very seldom tries to rise above the limited functionalities that such a story offers. It remains very much content with the very few moments of hilarity that could be afforded, and moves along a stereotyped path towards an extremely tame climax.

The characterizations in the film are pretty much plastic, starting from the Gandhian played by Vijayaraghavan. The school master, who is a steadfast follower of Gandhian principles goes on a fast to make his son agree to a marriage that he has envisioned for him. Lucky for him that Gandhiji isn't around to see the amusing causes for which the Nirahara is put to use these days!

If you ask me if there are some genuine moments of fun in the film, where you would be able to simply let go of all the logic and laugh your guts out, I would have to say 'No'. None of the antics of these three men or their aides make you laugh. The effects at times are quite the opposite even.

It's this randomness that gets tiring after a while, and the flat dialogues turns out to be a bit irksome after a while. After a while, you realize, that the film bears a resemblance to those films of the nineties that had a group of heroes making a mess of their lives and frantically trying to sort things out, to no avail.

The Biju Menon - Kunchacko Boban pair had worked wonders in 'Ordinary', but here the outcomes are nothing spectacular. Pitted against each other, they have very little to do on their own, and soon find themselves lost in the crowd. Jayasurya's feminine act is marred by his deliberate attempt not to have any shades of Dileep's performance in 'Chandupottu'. His dubbing could have been immensely better as well.

The women, though they are made to appear as if they have some serious stuff to do, serve not much of a purpose in the plot. While Samvrutha manages to get noticed, Bhama is wasted in a nonsensical role. Technically the film has no surprises in store either, and everything be it the music or the cinematography offers you no opportunity to be overwhelmed.

'101 Weddings' leaves you with a feeling that things could have been much, much better. These bleak, messy weddings that you are made to be a part of, seem to be in desperate search of making a point; something that they never manage to achieve.